22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year C)
Ecclesiasticus 3:19-21,30-31 | Psalm 67:4-7,10-11 | Hebrews 12:18-19,22-24 | Luke 14:1,7-14
When you are a [wedding] guest, make your way to the lowest place and sit there, so that, when your host comes, he may say, “My friend, move up higher.” (Luke 14:10)
I just had a mental image of a Catholic acquaintance and me coming to church for Sunday mass, and when I start walking towards the pews near the front, he holds me back, saying “Eh, be a bit more humble leh, sit at the back first, then wait for the wardens to say, ‘My friends, move up higher.’ ”
This scenario is almost laughable, but I’d bet each of us has experienced at least one occasion when we simply didn’t want to sit up front at church. It was probably a time when our souls were burdened with mundane woes and sinful guilt, when we silently echoed Matthew 8:8 in our hearts: “Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed.”
Yes Lord, You just say the word from over there, and my soul shall be healed over here. Can? ?
✞ ✞ ✞ ✞ ✞
A Eucharistic feast is not a wedding feast. There’s no implied ranking in pew positions, and the further we are from the celebrant, the less inclined we are to join in the feast with heart and soul – a great pity, given the trouble we go through just to be there at the appointed time.
So, dear brothers and sisters, the next time we go to church feeling a little distant from God, let’s remember the words to that familiar praise and worship song, and make an effort to draw closer to Him, both quietly in our hearts, and physically to the priest in persona Christi:
Lord, I come to you
Let my heart be changed, renewed
Flowing from the grace that I found in You
Amen.